# Shogun, by James Clavell **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 19, 2006, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596 "2006-01-19T02:47:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![PoorYorick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ecccb3/32.png) [@PoorYorick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PoorYorick)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/21 "2006-01-19T15:18:26Z")
> [@ivylass](#): > > I agree too, but King Rat has one of the most chilling last lines of a book I have ever read. OK, now you _have_ to tell me what the line is, even if it’s in a spoiler. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/22 "2006-01-19T15:59:41Z")
Indian people squat, too. I laughed when the other day I went to squat and did so exactly like an Indian person even though I haven’t done it for years. Anywya, I will definitely watch the miniseries…many people have recommended it to me. I’ll wait a couple of weeks, though, until the book sinks into my head. ---
**Author:** ![Rysto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecccb3/32.png) [@Rysto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysto)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/23 "2006-01-19T16:26:08Z")
> [@ivylass](#): > > I agree, Noble House was barely readable. Too confusing, too much packed in, considering the time span of the book is only one week. The books set earlier are a much easier read. Really? I put this one just a hair below King Rat and Shogun, myself. Whirlwind, though, I just can’t get into. The atmosphere is a real killer for me. I know that something awful’s going to happen so I really don’t want to get into the book and find out what. ---
**Author:** ![Beadalin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3be4f8/32.png) [@Beadalin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beadalin)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/24 "2006-01-19T16:58:15Z")
> [@](#): > > OK, now you have to tell me what the line is, even if it’s in a spoiler. Seconded. ---
**Author:** ![RobuSensei](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/919ad9/32.png) [@RobuSensei](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RobuSensei)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/25 "2006-01-19T17:30:01Z")
I enjoyed it greatly, but some of Clavell’s Japanese language constructions are _dire._😉 After I read it, I did a bit of online research, and came upon a book entitled [“Learning from Shogun.”](http://www.columbia.edu/~hds2/learning/) It came out some time around when the miniseries was first broadcast, and is now out of print, but the authors have placed it in PDF form on the web for free. (Download link at site). It’s an extensive comparison between Clavell’s somewhat fictionalized version of Japan and (what we know of) the real thing. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/26 "2006-01-19T17:39:15Z")
> [@PoorYorick](#): > > OK, now you _have_ to tell me what the line is, even if it’s in a spoiler. I could tell you, but without the entire book as context it wouldn’t have as much impact. King Rat is the shortest one, you should be able to read it in a weekend. (No flipping to the last page, either!) ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/27 "2006-01-19T17:57:21Z")
There are a few historical inaccuracies in Shogun, some of them howlers (not that I’m knocking it, it’s a fantastic book, I’m just sayin’). One of them is the use of flintlocks. Flintlocks were _juuuust_ barely invented towards the end of Ieyasu Tokugawa’s Shogunate, and weren’t in widespread use in Europe until after; they wouldn’t have made it to Japan in the timeframe of the book. The firearms in the book should have been matchlocks. Another is the political intrigue and oohing and aaahing over Pilot being a possible source of firearms from Europe, which would have been totally uneccesary. By the Ieyasu shogunate Japan already had a booming gunsmithing industry. Oda Nobunaga, one of Ieyasu’s predecessors, won a decisive battle using a peasant army with thousands of guns. One source, Noel Perrin in _Giving up the Gun: Japan’s Reversion to the Sword, 1543-1879_ states that prior to the banning of firearms there were more guns in Japan that all Europe _combined_. A funny one: at one point a big deal is made about a guy being named merely “porter,” his job, as he has no other name. I read on the internet somehwhere the Japanese word Clavell used actually means “railroad porter.” ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/28 "2006-01-19T18:21:53Z")
> [@pravnik](#): > > One source, Noel Perrin in _Giving up the Gun: Japan’s Reversion to the Sword, 1543-1879_ states that prior to the banning of firearms there were more guns in Japan that all Europe _combined_. This fact seems to be true. I always wondered why it was true, however. The Japanese did use guns in that period, but not in nearly enough quantity to justify the vast armaments business they built around it. They may have used thousands of gunners in various battles, but they may have had _millions_ of firearms. Just a strange thing. Incidentally, I didn’t like _Shogun_ nearly as much as the native Japanese novel _Musashi_. _Musashi_ is truly a classic, sublime work of art. Put _Shogun_ next to it, and it’s like looking at a DaVinci next to a child’s hamfisted copy. _Shogun_ is good - very good. But _Musashi_ is great. And that was even reading it in translation. The two books are also both semi-historical and cover around the same period. ---
**Author:** ![Kizarvexius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/da6949/32.png) [@Kizarvexius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kizarvexius)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/29 "2006-01-19T18:29:14Z")
One thing I appreciated about _Shogun_ was the way it taught me that I not only did not understand the Japanese mind, but that I would _never_ understand the Japanese mind. For example, there is a scene where one of the samurai (can’t remember which one it was) had found himself trapped on a stretch of seashore that was about to be swallowed up by the rising tide. Deciding that there is no way that he is going to come out of this alive, he sits himself down to await death stoically. In the meantime, Blackthorn, who is standing on the cliff overlooking the shore, is trying to lower a jury-rigged rope, but cannot get the samarai’s attention. So one of the samurai’s nobles throws himself off of the top of the cliff – to his death. This action catches the samurai’s notice, and he is subsequently rescued. This was one of the great WTF moments of the book. I thought that Clavell did an excellent job of introducing the reader to the Japanese language. By the time you get to the end of the book, you’re reading pages that contain any number of words and phrases in Japanese and don’t have any trouble following them. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/30 "2006-01-19T19:52:35Z")
I mean no disrespect, **Kizarvexius** , because I had the exact same reaction you did to that scene. However, that is ironically why I came to prefer native literature. The first half of _Shogun_, at least, depicts the Japanese, and particularly the Samurai, are not only strange but fundamentally alien. Native literaturte is much more approachable, in that it repsents the Samurai as different, but fundamentally human. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/31 "2006-01-19T20:16:23Z")
> [@pravnik](#): > > A funny one: at one point a big deal is made about a guy being named merely “porter,” his job, as he has no other name. I read on the internet somehwhere the Japanese word Clavell used actually means “railroad porter.” But was it true, as the old priest told Blackthorne, that in Japan of that period, only the samurai had personal and family names, and everyone else was named for their occupation? If so, when did that start to change? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/32 "2006-01-19T20:25:04Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > But was it true, as the old priest told Blackthorne, that in Japan of that period, only the samurai had personal and family names, and everyone else was named for their occupation? If so, when did that start to change? Now that I think of it, in _Shogun_ all the peasants of Anjiro had names. But maybe their names were just different words for “peasant.” ---
**Author:** ![cckerberos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@cckerberos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cckerberos)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/33 "2006-01-19T22:17:24Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > But was it true, as the old priest told Blackthorne, that in Japan of that period, only the samurai had personal and family names, and everyone else was named for their occupation? If so, when did that start to change? Peasants did not have family names, but their personal names were not solely by occupation. I’m not sure of the specifics regarding family names, but I know that non-samurai merchants had them, although that may have been a priviledge they had to purchase. Commoners received family names after the disestablishment of the class system following the Meiji Restoration (1868). ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/34 "2006-01-19T22:39:15Z")
You also have to remember that peasants were just one step below samurai, so it’s possible they had proper names. Merchants were considered parasites and were lower down the scale, with the _eta_ bottom of the barrel, those that handled corpses. I loved Clavell’s descriptions and how they evoked emotion. When Alvito was trying to trick Blackthorne over to Ferriera’s ship, he described a mouth-watering feast that made _me_ hungry. Since Blackthorne had been eating fish and rice and tofu, a nice juicy roasted capon sounded excellent. However, as Mariko was trying to find Blackthorne and she saw what he had eaten, _that_ description was a bit stomach-churning, even though it was the exact same meal! The cleanliness and purity of the Japanese as compared to the English and Dutch was also very apparent. I wanted to take a shower after Blackthorne visited his crew…ick ick ick. ---
**Author:** ![Ghanima](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Ghanima](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ghanima)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/35 "2006-01-19T22:42:26Z")
I loved Sho-gun. I also loved Tai-Pan, more than Sho-Gun actually. Gai-Jin kinda sucked, if you ask me. After the initial excitement, it was slooo-oo-o-w moving and it was very hard to sympathize with any of the characters. Plus the story just kind of sucked, and he could have told it in a third as many pages. King Rat wasn’t really my style, with the all-male cast and the military and the POW camp, although it was a good story for what it was - and the end did make an impact. I’m going to read Noble House soon, but it sounds like I’ll be skipping Whirlwind. ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/36 "2006-01-19T22:51:39Z")
Shogun has provided me with the precious little I know about Japanese culture. But I freely acknowledge that; after pontificating on some point, “blah blah blah but that’s just what I know from reading _Shogun_.” ---
**Author:** ![LiveOnAPlane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3d9bf3/32.png) [@LiveOnAPlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LiveOnAPlane)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/37 "2006-01-19T23:09:26Z")
I loved both the novel and the miniseries. What I found fascinating, though, is it’s one of the very few times a miniseries/movie did so well at keeping the flavor, feel, and quality of the novel. That’s rare. But perhaps I’m being unfair to the movie form, which has far less time to dela with the subject matter. ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/38 "2006-01-19T23:26:54Z")
> [@smiling bandit\[/quote](#): > > Incidentally, I didn’t like Shogun nearly as much as the native Japanese novel Musashi. Musashi is truly a classic, sublime work of art. Put Shogun next to it, and it’s like looking at a DaVinci next to a child’s hamfisted copy. Shogun is good - very good. But Musashi is great. And that was even reading it in translation. The two books are also both semi-historical and cover around the same period. Cool, I’m not familiar with that one (I know the historic Musashi and _The Book of Five Rings_, of cuss, but I’m not familiar with the novel). Is it a modern novel? > [@smiling bandit](#): > > I mean no disrespect, **Kizarvexius** , because I had the exact same reaction you did to that scene. However, that is ironically why I came to prefer native literature. The first half of _Shogun_, at least, depicts the Japanese, and particularly the Samurai, are not only strange but fundamentally alien. Native literaturte is much more approachable, in that it repsents the Samurai as different, but fundamentally human. Yeah, I had the same reaction to Shogun; in retropect it seems like Clavell was going way out of his way to point out the difference between cultures: Smiling samurai carves up peasant like pimento loaf! Samural kills self after falling in pit with gaijin! Samurai kills self so meditating samurai will notice rope! Samurai orders own son-in-law to crawl like a dog and kill self for insolence! It seems like he’s got them killing themselves off by at least three a day. I’ve heard arguments that ritual seppuku for every little infraction was really more the invention of samurai after Ieyasu and before the Meiji restoration, when the samurai had no wars to wage for many decades and literally nothing to do all day but ritualize and codify bushido a la _Hagakure_. Supposedly in former times when wars actually had to be waged as a way of life doing things like running off when outnumbered were considered practical, not shameful, although seppuku did exist and was used for particularly shameful transgressions and hopeless situations. Clavell’s samurai seem to have the much more rigid peacetime version of bushido that followed Ieyasu, and even then they’re a little too hardcore about it, throwing their and everyone else around’s lives away on mere whims. That’s kind of me just talking out of my ass/thinking out loud, though, take it with a grain of salt. ---
**Author:** ![Taran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/edb3f5/32.png) [@Taran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taran)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/39 "2006-01-20T00:34:58Z")
> [@pravnik](#): > > Cool, I’m not familiar with that one (I know the historic Musashi and _The Book of Five Rings_, of cuss, but I’m not familiar with the novel). Is it a modern novel? Assuming s/he meant the series by Eiji Yoshikawa, not really. According to the forword in my copy of _The Way of the Sword_, it was released serialized between 1935 and 1939, then collected into a five-volume book. The same forward (by Erwin Reischauer) calls _Musashi_ Japan’s _Gone With the Wind_. I enjoyed Shogun tremendously, but can’t stand any of the other Clavell books I’ve tried. _Gai-Jin_ and _Noble House_ were really ponderous, without the alien viewpoint to drive the book. And the Mariko-Blackthorne romance has no historical basis, alas. ---
**Author:** ![wolf\_in\_second\_hand\_clothing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/9d8465/32.png) [@wolf\_in\_second\_hand\_clothing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolf_in_second_hand_clothing)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596/40 "2006-01-20T00:44:20Z")
Great, now I think I have to read it again. In high school, my AP English class had reading day every friday for some reason. I picked up Shogun and figured it would last me quite a while, but I couldn’t put it down between reading days and it only lasted two weeks or so. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shogun-by-james-clavell/340596.md?page=3)